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Originally Posted by Truenorth00
Nowhere was it suggested that the ~$90 million was exclusively for track they own. It was suggested that this was the total spending required on the Ottawa-Montreal segment of HFR. If I find that source, I'll post.
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I was trying to find a reference to this and so far all I found was
this post on Urban Toronto that said, "I believe it was noted before that getting this portion up to HFR standards would cost $90 million." referring to the Alexandria Sub (not the the entire Montreal-Ottawa leg). Now this is hardly conclusive and the poster may have been mistaken, or I could be interpreting it incorrectly. Either way further digging will be required.
More interestingly, this was in reply to
this post by Urban Sky (who I believe is the same as our
Urban_Sky, not to be confused with
Urban Sky from Miami). Anyone who hasn't read this post, I highly recommend doing so!
The points I found most interesting were (but please read the original to get the full context):
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IIRC, the key idea of HFR was to create a project which was large enough to make a real change (i.e. to enable significant growth in ridership and revenues) while small enough to have a realistic chance of receiving the funding it needs. It therefore deliberately accepted the trade-offs which deviate from what some people here feel “would be right” (such as double-tracking, grade separation of all level crossings or electrication) and left them as “upgrades” which could be added at a later point. Similarly, in terms of providing a path towards HSR, the emphasis was to minimize waste (i.e. infrastructure work which can’t be upgraded to HSR) rather than future-proofing every single infrastructure work.
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Quote:
the Alexandria Sub is already built to close-to-HFR standards and has historically allowed travel times (1:35h) close to those envisioned by HFR.
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This to me indicates that the upgrades planned for the Alexandria Sub are minimal (thus explaining the low cost) but in isolation, those upgrades would also have minimal effect on the total Montreal-Ottawa travel time. My guess is its upgrades would be limited to moving the sidings to line up with the hourly departures of HFR. Different departure intervals would require sidings at different locations, thus upgrades done now would likely not be reusable by HFR.
The upgrades that will have the biggest effect would be from obtaining dedicated tracks east of the Alexandria Sub, and that would likely cost much more than the quoted price. Could it be done ahead of time? Yes, but it takes time to negotiate the appropriate deals with the rail line owners. (CN & CP). There is a big difference to the owners being interested in making a deal and actually signing a deal. It all comes down to what does that $90 million actually include and is it a real quote?
The other interesting quote from the post was related to the approach into Toronto:
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Therefore, the Stouffville line could show a cheaper alignment from Agincourt Yard into Union Station, requiring only little engineering works over what would be required for Metrolinx anyways, while accessing a better transit hub (Kennedy vs. Eglinton). Sure, with Metrolinx’ long-term plans, this corridor might get too crowded, but until then, this routing could reduce the price tag for HFR, while only having minimal negative effect on travel time (considering that the shared section between the intersection with CP’s Belleville Sub and Scarborough Junction would only be 7 km long and so far has no other stations than Kennedy). And once traffic on the Stouffville Sub grows beyond what would make VIA’s presence tolerable, the only engineering work no longer be operationally required would be the ramp between Belleville and Stouffville Sub, but could still provide operational flexibility in the case that there is any disruption in the Don Valley.
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None of this is conclusive, but it is food for thought.